The present invention relates generally to vehicles having dozer blades mounted thereon and more particularly to a mounting arrangement wherein the entire mounting mechanism can be formed separately and can readily be attached to any vehicle with minimum modification thereof.
Various types of mounting arrangements for bulldozer blades have been proposed. A typical mounting arrangement for a dozer blade usually consists of a C-frame that has arms extending along opposite sides of the vehicle and the arms are attached for pivotal movement adjacent the rear of the vehicle or tractor. The blade is then supported in some manner on the bite portion of the C-shaped frame and numerous hydraulic rams are positioned at selected locations so that the blade may be angled, tilted, and raised and lowered.
While such arrangements have been found satisfactory for construction of large bulldozers, they are too complicated and expensive for use in mounting a blade on smaller vehicles. Furthermore, the wide C-shaped frame increases the overall width of the small vehicle and therefore decreases the versatility of the unit. For example, proposals have been made for attaching a backfill blade to a small vehicle without the use of the large C-shaped frame. One example of the simplified attachment for a backfill blade to a small vehicle is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,759,110, assigned to the assignee of the present invention, which discloses a mounting arrangement for a blade that is capable of being angled and laterally shifted to provide blade overhang on either side of the vehicle during operation.
Another type of mounting mechanism that has been developed by the assignee of the present invention includes a bracket structure that is pivoted on a vehicle through a fluid ram and pivotally supports a pair of arms that have the blade attached to the outer end thereof. The arms and blade are raised and lowered through the use of a fluid ram interposed between the bracket and the blade.
One of the inherent shortcomings of both of these types of mounting arrangements is that there is no capability of tilting the blade about a longitudinal axis to change the angle of orientation of the lower edge of the blade with respect to the ground.